I agree that, if you push it, dodges can be used too liberally.
The base-line is two dodges every 20 seconds iirc. That’s a decent base-line.
But once you add Vigor, Energy Sigils and various traits and abilities it gets a bit stupid.
But in the grand scale of things this is a fairly minor issue and would probably be best addressed with nerfing boon-spam in general.
Almost 2000 votes and more than 2/3 want it removed.
Now 2000 votes is a representative sample and while I do think the poll needed a “undecided/don’t care” option I do believe it reflects the communities wishes.
I have no issue with the Gold → Gem conversion rate. Yes, it’s high, but they also want to discourage people from using it.
What I’m not ok with though is what real-money buys me for Gems. 10$ for a pitiful amount of Gold or a single Gem-store item isn’t good enough, sorry.
I really haven’t noticed a big shift in the D/P meta. It’s still a popular and powerful build, arguably even OP against other melee-focused builds.
Aside from excessive condition spam I don’t have very many issues with other classes.
I’m not sure about the Sigil choices however. Sigil of Air for mainhand seems like a given because of the added burst, but I’m not sure what and how frequently the off-hand is procced.
I’d wager that Sigil of Force might be a better choice since it adds to your Backstab burst and doesn’t require you to use skills 3-5 to procc the Sigil on a regular basis.
I agree,
sPvP currently is the least fun it has ever been. The more this game shifts towards bunkers and conditions, the less enjoyable it becomes.
D/P is still very popular afaik and I still play it on my Thief in WvW. It practically hard-counters many Warrior builds if played right (not that many do however) and the Blind spam is highly effective against pretty much every non-AI, non-condition spam, build.
Do you have much experience with Fractals and Dungeons? Because the “go-to” PvE builds are typically all about damage and not very forgiving to play for newer players.
Anyway, for your situation I’d recommend 5/6/0/3/0 while wielding Sword + Pistol most of the time. Remember that Black Powder is the single best asset a Thief brings to any party as it provides him and everyone near him with nigh impunity to melee damage against all but champion mobs.
The 15 points in Acrobatics are there for the added HP, which is a little more forgiving, and the generous dodges provided by Feline Grace. They aren’t really needed, strictly speaking, but they give you a lot of wiggle room if you’re less experienced.
Most of the time however you will just be using Black Powder every 4 seconds and auto-attacking.
I’m a bit surprised to see Hambow so far above all else.
I guess this being sPvP explains that since it is a very common and very popular build to play. But aside from Healing Signet it’s difficult to pin-point a single aspect that makes Hambows “broken”.
- Combustion Shot is really only good because of Conquest.
- Cleansing Ire + Burst Mastery + Combustion Shot make for very readily available condition removal.
- Sigil of Intelligence is very effective on Hambows with Soldier stats and Runes of Strength.
- Constant Hammer stuns and CC combined with Healing Signet make for a very durable combination.
Hambow as a build is OP, but its OPness is derived from a series of very specific synergies that don’t really translate outside of sPvP Conquest. That’s why I don’t really think it’s a broken build, unlike something like PU which has no redeemable game-play qualities whatsoever.
Make sure your enemies are distracted. That’s by far the most helpful thing when running a Thief which is why it works so well to run with a tanky partner.
WvW scoring will be addressed after ANet removes Skyhammer from sPvP.
I never felt that %-based damage increases made particularly interesting Sigil choices. They don’t really interact with anything in an interesting way.
They could all go for all I care. Keep the proccs and other interactive ones but remove the flat-damage boosts.
We are currently fighting the same match-up for the 4th time this season. The Swiss tournament is dumb, but then so is the entire WvW scoring system.
I used to play a Valkyrie Hidden Killer Backstab build before crafting my Berserker Ascended gear.
I think crafting Berserker gear was a good choice for the following reasons:
1. PvE: I know this might not be a top concern for you but Berserker gear is the prime choice for all PvE content. And that’s always nice. It means you can go Fractals or just regular dungeons without gimping yourself.
2. Guard Leech devalues Vitality: Even with Berserker gear and Hybrid Accessories I still have about 18.000 HP when fully buffed in WvW. Valkyrie would have about 21.000. That’s only about 15% more and not as big of a deal as you might think.
3. More HP doesn’t make as big a difference in practice: Yes, in theory I’d pick 3000 HP over 15% Critical Strike chance too. But not if we already have 18.000 HP. I also play D/P most of the time where most mitigation comes from Blind spam. Having a big HP pool just isn’t all that useful a lot of the time.
4. Berserker gear will always be useful, Valkyrie gear is limited to a particular build and a particular play-style. You basically limit yourself to one build and one spec by choosing that gear.
0€. There’s nothing to spend gems on.
I don’t support RNG, I don’t care about mini’s, I already have the dyes I like, I don’t need more bag space or character slots, all style items are ugly, I don’t need boosts (especially not for that price), and most items under the services tab are overpriced.
I’m in the same boat.
On one hand I like not having to buy anything extra, but I really feel like the game deserves some of my money.
The problem is I’m very sensitive towards value/money.
When I spent 50$ on the entire game I can’t justify spending 20$ on items like Infinite Gathering Tools no matter how convenient they are. They are literally just a few items costing 40% of what the entire game cost me.
I don’t care much for aesthetics, especially not if they have no prestige attached to them.
I don’t need more character slots or bank slots and even if I did, I don’t feel they are good value/money.
I’d be willing to pay for more content, especially if it was much better designed than what we currently have, but ANet isn’t selling content yet and core game-play at the moment is simply too shallow to get invested in it.
If you roll a human female with cultural armor you will literally be the least unique looking character in the entire game.
If this game truly had any collaborative development ambitions then why am I still seeing Skyhammer in SoloQ?
If even Engis are complaining about condition spam we know it’s serious.
But yeah, condition spam has reached stupid proportions in this game, I agree.
Same here.
But I’ve been saying this for y year now. I just wonder how many more of these threads we have to post here each day until something is done about it.
How they deal with feedback is best exemplified by Skyhammer.
They’ve ignored the complaints for a year now. I’m sure they can keep that up for a whil still.
Skyhammer must be really popular at the office.
Merchant will come after they remove Skyhammer from SoloQ.
It is known.
Ascended cooking, now more complicated than Legendary crafting.
I don’t really focus on the stats per se.
But I do follow a certain logic.
In general I like to have 15.000 HP when doing level 80 content. That includes PvE and WvW. I can get that with Practiced Tolerance and the Berserker/Valkyrie Hybrid items so there isn’t a huge sacrifice.
Other than that I value Power > Precision > Ferocity in PvE and Power > Ferocity > Precision for WvW. But that really doesn’t affect my gear-choices as I run Berserker Hybrid anyway.
I agree with you two OPs, well said.
I’ve always felt that GW2’s balance was too extreme.
Glass cannon duels last 6 seconds, while bunkers can’t even put a dent in each other.
Building for conditions means you spread conditions EVERYWHERE, constantly with barely avoidable skills and abilities.
Yet the massive stacking of condition removal counters that, which is equally overpowered.
When fighting near a Guardian you are constantly rolling with various boons. Targeted boon application and removal is impossible because boons are constantly spammed and refreshed. You removed Protection and Regeneration from a Ranger? No gain, because he has them right back again.
And then trend just continues. Fresh-air Eles can practically instant-gib most builds while bunker Guardians never die to less than 2 players. It’s a broken balance.
Imo the class most responsible for this meta though is bunker Guardians. They turn even fairly offensive builds into immortal bunkers while cleansing conditions and just generally adding tons of longevity to their team. Their role has been undisputed and unchallenged for 2 years now and it has to change. Bunker Guardians literally ruin this game.
Serious answer.
It’s about perception.
Generally speaking players have a certain expectation when it comes to class balance. We all expect to have a reasonable chance against any other class.
When we come up against a class that falls out of this balance spectrum we call it OP.
A few good points OP. Especially the paper gates and how quickly they breach is a big problem. Gates should be the first thing you upgrade, not walls, since they are most vulnerable.
But imo the #1 issue is that even with a well-prepared defense, you still cannot hold against far-superior numbers. With rally and hard-rezzes it can be impossible to chip-away an attacking zerg, even with lots of defensive weapons.
Wiping an enemy is only possible if you have a significant force of your own. Otherwise defense is futile.
They really just need to cut out that intermediate boss and his clown car.
You should go from blowing up the door, straight to the endboss.
How to casual:
If you’re on a necromancer, you’re already doing a good job.
This line cracked me up!
Conquest is an inherently frustrating game-mode.
If someone isn’t pulling their weight or even afk, it means you can’t do kitten. You will constantly be outnumbered in fights, respawning more often, which just snowballs the entire game.
ANet has designed a game-mode in which there is NO FUN to be had when not winning.
Warsong Gulch, Alterac Valley and most other BGs from other MMOs are at least somewhat entertaining, even when losing. You can still kill people and get a sense of accomplishment from that.
In GW2 Conquest it’s either be better or get farmed.
And verbal abuse is just a way for players to vent that frustration. It’s not mature and often not fair either, but it’s completely human. Try not to get all that caught up in it and blame the game, rather than the players. They after all, only react to the way the game way designed.
(edited by Dee Jay.2460)
Conditions are a cancer in this game. Seriously killing whatever is left of active combat.
The only reason they don’t run rampant in team play and WvW is because of Guardians who basically carry the entire meta.
I observed a bug for the first time today, multiple times, that wouldn’t register your own treb as destroyed, thus not spawning the repair kit.
The mini-map wouldn’t display it as destroyed either but it clearly was.
This effectively meant that it wasn’t possible to repair the Treb after it was initially destroyed.
The TP in Guild Wars 2 IS the entire game.
Unlike other MMOs GW2 doesn’t have achievement-based progression. Anything you want is gained from money.
People grind events because they don’t like/ aren’t good at playing the trade-post, the center-piece of the game.
If you ask people why they mindlessly farm auto-shot afk events all day it’s because everyone is hoping for a rare and profitable drop that will somehow elevate their wealth.
GW2’s entire game is built upon the trade-post. Without it it would instantly collapse because it doesn’t have much real, tangible depth or game-play to sustain it.
WvW is really the only aspect of the game that holds up on its own and is fairly independent of the TP. But even there many things tie to it.
Every form of progression, be it Ascended Gear or Legendaries, comes down to Gold. And that’s why everyone is trying to farm it in their own way.
I sort of agree.
I mean I teamQ most of the time and very rarely will people there play for score. But you’re right it’s a completely useless metric and ought to be removed.
Because Sizer.
That’s the best and most accurate explanation you’ll get.
Not everyone stops and thinks if the build makes sense for them, in their particular situation. I assume Sizer ran that build because it helped him keep up with some of the insanely bunkerish builds that dominate the tournament scene. Normal glass-cannon builds (D/P, S/P) just can’t keep up with these bunkers who also apply consistent pressure via auto-attack and conditions. S/D has quite a lot of sustain. It also gives you the great utility from Trickery both with boon-stripping and on-demand interrupts, which are very useful in team-fights. Sizer also said that S/D is simply his favorite build to play so there’s that to consider too.
But frankly I don’t think this build is really ideal for everyone to run in every situation. S/D is as close as a Thief gets to running a bunker build without ruining his role.
But if you watched the tournament there will still plenty of S/P Thieves running around. It’s still a perfectly viable set, just less forgiving than before and not nearly as strong against the whole bunker-meta as before.
People kitten the power of a build based on 1v1 situations, and S/D performs quite well in that aspect. And until that changes it will remain a popular build, even if other builds suit the Thief’s role better.
(edited by Dee Jay.2460)
D/P practically hard-counters any Axe + Greatsword Warrior. Keep and eye out for Berserker Stance and after that it’s GG because none of their attacks is fast enough to counter your Blind spam.
Engis are a different story. Their condition spam really is hard to keep up with.
Amen.
entire trait-lines add less condition duration than this food. It needs a nerf.
Anet hasn’t cared about this for the past 2 years, why do you think they care now?
Loved the D7D section, really ace movement and positioning. Interesting build too, combining both survivability, dodges and damage.
P/D on the other hand, as I’m sure you’re aware, is basically like playing with training wheels and a safety net.
It seems US teams like rolling a lot tankier, compared to the “superior rotation” strats that top EU teams have.
It’s a shame we don’t see more EU style comps.
It used to be like this in WoW Arenas too.
NA would try to win by outcomping the enemy and finding a new FotM while EU teams would tend to prefer playing whatever worked for them and be less eager about chasing the next FotM.
Today, after almost 6 months of playing TeamQ exclusively I decided to give SoloQ another shot.
Skyhmmer, twice in a row.
Quickly I remembered why I left SoloQ behind. This map alone basically ruins an entire game-type for me.
GJ ANet on disregarding feedback regarding Skyhammer for over a year now.
We’ve easily had 1-2 anti-Skyhammer threads a day for a year now.
Maybe ANet will listen this time?
First off, your gear doesn’t matter in sPvP.
Did you set-up your PvP build before joining a game? If not, go into the mists and click the “PvP build” button on the top. Then make sure you select the Berserker amulet. You can also try various different rune-sets, all with different strengths. Runes of Strength are a popular choice for all classes at the moment.
Sigils can also be picked for weapons. If you’re looking for burst, Sigil of Air is a good choice but there are a number of viable choice. Try them out and find out for yourself.
Anyway, I assume that’s the problem you’re experiencing and that it doesn’t have anything to do with your play-style.
Yeah, it’s called Cloaked in Shadows. -_-
Anyway, they key to defeating Thieves with conditions is to apply many different forms of conditions instead of just relying on one or two types.
Thieves can only remove 1 condition every 3 seconds and only while in stealth. If you only stack Bleed then you won’t be able to apply much pressure. You need to adapt your build to apply lots of different conditions.
In EUToL there was an average of more than one guardian for team.
Should guardians be nerfed?
Abso-kittening-lutely.
They should have been nerfed years ago. That class alone probably defines the bunker-meta more than any other and imo is by far the biggest reason why everyone goes so defensive.
Let alone the fact that they make up up to 50% of guild WvW zergs.
Take all that support Guardians provide and share it among the less fortunate classes and see how things go from there.
But is it still PvP when nothing dies?
Anyways, I don’t fault the guys for bringing bunker meta + conquest to its logical conclusion. Everyone had the same chance to do so and they came out on top.
So gratz to them.
Mug ccertainly doesn’t need to return to its previous form. It used to crit for 6000 which was just stupid.
As for Cloak and Dagger, we don’t need to speculate how “OP” it would be since PvE and WvW both use the unnerfed version. And I don’t recall the last time I got hit by a Cloak and Dagger that really made me gasp.
Limiting it to “out of combat” would suffice.
But yes, this has been brought up quite a number of times.
As you can see Anet doesn’t care for such fundamental flaws. But let’s get more Living World stuff… -_-.
Toxic is the new condition.
#conditionmeta